


Painting in the Park

by mssrj_335



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Artist!Dean, Fanciful Cas, M/M, Oneshot, Pining, Writer!Castiel, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-13
Updated: 2016-01-13
Packaged: 2018-05-13 17:08:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5710309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mssrj_335/pseuds/mssrj_335
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cas decides today is the day.  He's finally going to talk to the painter he sees in the park.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Painting in the Park

He was going to do it. Definitely, _for sure_ , this time. He was going to talk to him.

 

It’d been close to a month since the beginning of summer and the first appearance of the artist in his university's park. Every Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday the artist plopped down on the same bench under the cherry tree, unrolled the same brush set, and put up the same easel. It wasn’t that he hadn’t tried to figure out what the artist was painting; far from it! He tried walking behind, around in circles, and finally through the artist’s line of sight, but he couldn’t ever figure out what was so damn pretty out here to be painting. The little duck pond was glazed with algae like yesteryear’s deserted donuts, the ducklings grown and gone. A few community dogs liked to tromp through the wilting flower beds and tussle under desiccated bushes every now and then.  But usually, summer heatwaves rose from the asphalt on the other side of the park, distorting the pond and flowers into some sort of strange Salvador Dali study in Americana.

 

But that. Was. It. Maybe he just couldn’t see it in the right light, didn’t see what the artist’s eye beheld. And eyes he did have, damn him. Even from a distance, he could see just how colorful the sunbursts of the painter's irises shone. The artist made him think of what summer should be, green and vibrant and aching of home. And that, precisely, was what spurred him on today, pulling him up from the walking trail behind the artist and wrenching a stiff salutation from his mouth.

 

“Hello there,” he mumbled.

 

He waited. A second. He stuffed his hands in his pockets. The artist was still painting.

 

“My name is Castiel,” he tried again.

 

Again, no answer. The artist’s deft hands continued to blot ink and medium, bristles scratching over wet canvas. Castiel stood frozen, disappointed. Oh god, he really was off-putting. Who completely ignored a perfectly good hello?

 

 _Oh_. The artist had earbuds stuffed into his perfect ears. Of course he couldn’t hear him.

 

He just continued painting, rightfully so, because it was as if Castiel had never spoken. The old question about the tree falling in the forest with no one around struck him in a moment of existential zen then, he sighed. The artist was still fully immersed, painting in a wet black canvas like some sort of possessed Bob Ross. Castiel leaned against the artist’s bench, not directly behind him, but off to the side. He watched. He should have moved on, passed go and collected his $200, but he was waxing poetic. The artist didn’t have long, slender fingers like he’d imagine. Rather, his hands were large and rough and scarred, as if he built barbed-wire fence eight hours a day. His hands should have suggested clumsiness, but the way he moved his brush said quite the opposite.

 

“You know,” Castiel said, to the unaffected artist, “I’m an artist, too.” He glanced down; the painter still wasn’t hearing him. Oh well. “Not in the same sense that you are, I suppose. I tell stories; I’m a creative writing major...  Do you go to school here?”  No answer, but Castiel couldn't say he expected one.  A pause, a scratching of bristles.  Then he snorted, latching on to a silly thought sauntering through his head. “Let’s make art.”

 

He leaned back against the tree and looked out at the park. There weren’t any dogs, but there was a man, running toward them on the concrete path. The thought in his head hatched into an idea and sprouted.

 

“Take this man, for instance,” Castiel said, nodding to the runner even though the artist couldn't see him. “He’s running, but what on earth is he running from? No one runs for fun, there’s always something. Let’s say he’s some sort of cursed god, doomed to run to keep the clock of Time ticking.”

 

Castiel glanced down again. The painter’s hands had slowed, his black background finished. Blobs of sickly green and smears intense blue spattered the canvas, but there wasn’t anything he could recognize yet. Castiel shifted, stared out at the pond for a while and listened to the sounds of creation until his thoughts reformed.

 

“This puddle of putrescence is undoubtedly a portal to the Underworld," he said with an abortive gesture, "and four times a year he has to descend this set of Hellstairs to change the clock to run through the next season.” By his standards, it wasn’t much of a story. But the runner was coming nearer and his face was etched with exhaustion, so he continued.

 

“He must fight his way past the two-headed, three-toed tentacle guards of the Underworld and their tridents, past all of the damned souls who just want the clock to stop. If the clock stops, then Time stops, and their suffering is over, you understand. But if he stops running, that means all that live now, damned or not, will be sent to the Underworld as punishment for the end of Time. Including him. So, he keeps running. Once he changes the clock, he has to run up the Hellstairs and run again. His feet blister in the summer and bleed in the winter, but can you imagine his thighs? I pity the person who goes down on him when his curse is up.”

 

The artist snorted and Castiel started. He’d been so caught up in his story that he hadn’t noticed the painter’s hands had slowed and the soft music filtering through his earbuds had paused. The artist turned to him, fixing him with bright green eyes and a raised eyebrow.

 

“Who says the curse is ever up?”

 

Oh god, his voice was perfect, too. Rough and low, his cheeky remark skipped over pouting lips and pulled a silly response out of Castiel’s mouth.

 

“All curses have to end sometime,” he replied, mouth hanging agape, almost inviting a summer junebug to land on his tangled tongue.

 

The artist smirked and dropped his brushes into a cup on his easel before he stood. He stretched, and Castiel watched out of the corner of his eye. God, who knew anatomy could be so beautiful? Nothing in any of the sciences ever spoke of the pulchritude of muscles when they strained and reformed. Not one of his professors could have ever told him how lovely the forces of elasticity were until the artist shrugged out of his stretching into a comfortable stance and offered Castiel his hand.

 

“Dean,” he said with a smile.

 

He shook Dean’s hand. “Castiel.”

 

Dean smiled and wrinkled his nose, freckles--delightful tempting devils--daring to sit scattered over it. “Quite a story you got goin’ on, Cas,” he teased. “Think you could tell me more over coffee?”

 

Castiel’s smile widened at the nickname. He glanced at Dean’s painting and thought he could make out the beginnings of the Hellstairs to the Underworld. Well, great minds and all that…

 

“I’d love it.”

**Author's Note:**

> i don't know what this is. self-edited, so if you see any mistakes, let me know!


End file.
